Ian Law 'Out of the living, out of the office'

A special online commission for Chisenhale Gallery’s website produced by Ian Law as part of our 21st Century programme. Out of the living, out of the office features edited rehearsal footage from Law's performance held at Chisenhale Gallery on 12th November 2015.

In 1995 Chisenhale Gallery hosted a touring exhibition by the artist Absalon (1964-93), featuring four of his Cellules – full-scale architectural models of idealised living units. Absalon died shortly after the exhibition opened at Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris in 1993 and before it travelled to Chisenhale.

Law re-composed text from the archived correspondence relating to the exhibition – documents, faxes, press cuttings and educational workshop material – to form a text piece, a performance and this online commission. He addresses the elusiveness of Absalon and his work, exploring the limitations of language and the disjointed nature of communication through the partial accounts of events surrounding the exhibition, found in the archive.

The performance took place within a specially constructed set comprising foam structures based on drawings from a schools’ workshop, which Law found in the archive. For the workshop the children were asked to draw their own idealised living units based on Absalon’s Cellules and then made cardboard maquettes from the drawings. The schools’ workshop was held in the studio space at Chisenhale Gallery, where Law’s performance also took place.

Performers: Fred Bungay, Aisha Butt, Dan Munn and Hatty Nestor

Photography: Plastiques

Edited by Ian Law and Plastiques

Chisenhale Gallery’s 21st Century programme 2015-16 is supported by Marie and Joe Donnelly.